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When I first heard about Vicente, I was anxious to hear him live. I heard through the grape vine it would be a cold day in hell because he has fear of flying and would only go where a car or train could take him. Obviously he DID tour the world eventually, been to US at least 4 times I know of, but perhaps he keeps it to a minimum for the reason I heard earlier.
I've heard performing in Germany as a foreigner is VERY expensive tax wise, which is why few flamenco performers besides PDL ever made it over here, it's just not worth it financially. Vicente's been to Holland a few times too, but never to Germany.
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Don't sweat the petty things and don't pet the sweaty things
I missed him in London a couple of years back so am very excited about it.
Coming over from Ulm eh? just for the day or a week or something. Are you gonna see anything else at the guitar festival??
Very high taxes in germany you say??
Surely other performers in other genres tour to germany without tax worry, why should flamenco pros suffer? Is it cos their earnings are sgnificantly lower than pop/rock stars??
Well, it's a special interest so it's harder to promote and fill the halls than the average pop group who gets played on the radio and MTV, and if as a foreigner you have to pay a high percentage of your earnings to the state, you have to earn enough from the show to make it worthwhile.
Performers like PDL and Gerardo get the jazz fans in there too and fill the halls, but I think it's more difficult for others. Flamenco is really gaining popularity here though. Gerardo had a show at the Darmstadt theater recently which sold out. I'd love to see performers like Vicente, Nino de Pura, Santiago Lara play live here too. Hopefully just a matter of time...
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Don't sweat the petty things and don't pet the sweaty things